Business Management

Bachelor of Science Degree

Program Outline

Your program consists of 120 credits and is designed to provide the knowledge and skills you’ll need for your career.

You will receive credit for previous college work if it meets Penn Foster College standards and matches the curriculum requirements. If you wish to receive credit for previous coursework, contact the college you attended and ask that your official transcripts by forwarded to Penn Foster College for evaluation.

All previous college work must have been completed with a grade of “C” or better, and up to 75% of the required credits may be transferred. We will also credit your tuition for all the courses that are acceptable.

We’ll send your first course materials immediately after your enrollment for the first semester has been accepted. Once your transcripts have been evaluated, the required courses will follow one at a time as you complete your required assignments, so you’ll always have learning materials to work with.

Computer Specifications
As you know this is an online academic program. This means you will need access to high-speed internet to begin your program. In addition, you will need access to a Microsoft® Windows® based computer running Windows 10® or later or an Apple® Mac® computer running macOS® or later, Microsoft® Office 2019 or Microsoft 365® and an email account to complete this program with Penn Foster.

All students must successfully meet the 120 credit requirements described below to earn a Bachelor of Science Degree:

Program Goal and Outcomes

Program Goal
To prepare students for professional opportunities in management by providing a thorough background in the functional areas of modern business, such as human resources, finance/accounting, administration, marketing, and operations. Students will obtain skills they can apply immediately in the business workplace and the professional practices and benefits of general education required for lifelong personal growth in today's global economy. In addition, this program provides a foundation for further studies.

Program Outcomes
Upon completion of the program, students will be able to...

  • Demonstrate effective written and interpersonal communication skills
  • Demonstrate a high level of inquiry, analytical, and problem-solving skills
  • Demonstrate effective quantitative skills
  • Demonstrate computer and information literacy
  • Demonstrate an understanding of the liberal arts, natural sciences, and social sciences
  • Demonstrate an understanding of the principles and processes involved in the functional areas and the need for collaboration among the different functions
  • Discuss the management function and application to the business organization and develop problem solving skills needed for management
  • Discuss the steps of the accounting cycle and utilize financial document information as a management tool to plan, and track the financial status of a business
  • Discuss the factors affecting marketing plans to promote the business’s products or services through an understanding of marketing principles, consumer buying habits, and advertising strategies
  • Discuss and apply ethical and legal standards to the business environment
  • Demonstrate an understanding of economic and financial markets and apply financial and economic principles to business decisions
  • Discuss the human resources function as it relates to the business environment
  • Analyze and evaluate the main structural features of a business or industry and develop strategies to position a firm attractively in the business environment
  • Discuss the theories, influences, cultural forces, labor factors and methods of successfully entering international markets
  • Discuss the scientific method and approach to a variety of research methods likely to be useful to supporting successful decision making in business

 

Semester 1

Business Orientation (1 credit)
Succeed by learning how to use your Penn Foster program, and learn how to effectively manage your time, talents, and resources in your personal life, academics, and in your career.

Objectives:

  • Understand how to use your Student Portal, including your My Homepage and My Courses pages.
  • Access the Penn Foster Community and use it to find answers.
  • Connect with Penn Foster on various social media sites.
  • Examine your individual life goals and the steps needed to fulfill them.
  • Recognize how your personal financial goals mirror that of most businesses.
  • Use time management skills to make the most of your day.
  • Determine personal financial goals.
  • Set up a typical budget.
  • Explain why creative thinking, research, planning, gathering resources, and production and marketing are vital for the start-up and maintenance of a business.

Information Literacy (1 credit)
Get better at finding and using information!

Objectives:

  • Search the Internet more effectively.
  • Get tips about search engines and reliable websites.
  • Learn how to search libraries and other information centers for important, useful information.

Introduction to Business (3 credits)
This course outlines the elements of business and the challenges businesses face in a global environment, such as competition and economic factors. You'll learn why accounting, technology and information systems, marketing, and management are essential to starting and growing a business. You'll also learn the basics of managing financial and human resources and the ethical and social responsibilities required of a successful manager.

Objectives:

  • Identify different elements that distinguish capitalism, socialism, communism, and mixed economies
  • Define the role of small business in the free enterprise system
  • Assess elements of the global economy, such as labor, capital, trade, and natural resources, and how they influence business
  • Analyze the functions of business, such as management, organization, human relations, marketing, financing, and ethics
  • Identify the purpose of business policy and strategy

Principles of Management (3 credits)
In the business world, people are sometimes put into management situations when they really don’t understand what management is all about. Although some are able to step into a management position and handle it naturally, others find the responsibilities to be overwhelming. Management courses are a must. For those proficient in managerial positions, management courses can help improve their skills and gain a better understanding of their new responsibilities. For those who are overwhelmed by a new management position, or who strive to secure a management position, management courses help by presenting concepts and ideas to build new skills.

This course is divided into lessons that discuss the foundations and principles of management, planning, organizing, leading, and controlling. As you read the textbook, try to relate the material to your own experiences. If you don’t have any management experience, try to put yourself in the place of your manager and relate the material to those experiences.

Objectives:

  • Summarize the functions of management and the basic steps in various planning processes
  • Explain how to make effective decisions as a manager and a leader
  • Describe the fundamental elements of an organization’s structure and the components of an organization’s competitive environment
  • Explain principles for setting goals that motivate employees, why companies develop control systems, and why teamwork is beneficial
  • Analyze why diversity is a critical organizational and managerial issue, and describe the criteria for technology decisions and managing change
  • Demonstrate the foundations and principles of management by completing an open-book proctored exam

Textbook: M: Management

Music Appreciation (3 credits)
In this course, you'll practice the skill of active listening. Learning to listen differently will allow you to experience all kinds of music in a new way. Most listeners are familiar with how music makes them feel, and we often say we like a particular piece of music because it has a "good beat" or a beautiful melody. This course will allow you to go deeper. You'll identify what the composer might have been trying to convey and listen for the way elements of musical composition and performance make each piece unique.

Objectives:

  • Identify the building blocks of music a composer can use to create a piece, such as rhythm, melody, harmony, texture, form, and timbre
  • Differentiate between the music of the baroque era and the musical styles of previous time periods
  • List the major characteristics of classical music, including form, melody, and instrumentation
  • Describe the musical trends and innovations that occurred during the romantic era
  • Relate musical styles of the early twentieth century to comparable movements in art and literature
  • Explain the evolution of American popular music in the twentieth century
  • Describe the influence of world music on modern western composition
  • Synthesize research comparing composers' influence in their respective genres

Textbook: Experience Music

Mathematics for Business and Finance (3 credits)
This course will provide a foundation in basic mathematical operations. You'll learn about percentages, discounts, interest, present worth, sinking funds, installment buying, pricing, depreciation, investments, insurance, the use of symbols and their applications, equations and formulas, and the importance of statistics.

Objectives:

  • Analyze functions of whole numbers, fractions, decimals, and percents
  • Show calculations involved in simple interest, compound interest, and time value of money
  • Prepare various business math applications involving financial reports, installment buying, and depreciation
  • Analyze various financial concepts related to taxes, insurance, financial investments, and basic business statistics
  • Describe other HRM functions including collective bargaining, labor relations, global HRM, and building a high-performance organization
  • Prepare for the final exam

Textbook: Practical Business Math Procedures

Proctored Exam
You will be required to complete a proctored exam on selected courses each semester. These assessments will evaluate the knowledge and skills that you learned during the semester. You choose the time, the location, and the qualified exam supervisor.

 

Semester 2

Computer Applications (3 credits)
Microsoft® Office allows people to create documents, spreadsheets, presentations, and databases. This course will teach you how to use three popular tools from the Microsoft® Office Suite — Word™, Excel®, and PowerPoint®. In this course, you'll learn how to use Word™ to create and edit text documents, insert figures and tables, and format pages for a variety of uses. You'll then learn how to use Excel® to organize and format data, including charts, formulas, and more complex tables. Next, you'll learn how to use PowerPoint® to create and deliver slide shows. Finally, you'll complete a graded project, which will test the skills acquired in Word™, Excel®, and PowerPoint®.

Objectives:

  • Create various Microsoft® Word™ documents.
  • Produce a thorough Microsoft® Excel® spreadsheet.
  • Identify the basic skills needed to use Microsoft® PowerPoint®.
  • Synthesize what you’ve learned by integrating Word™, Excel®, and PowerPoint®.

English Composition (3 credits)
This course teaches the skills and techniques of effectively developing, drafting, and revising college-level essays toward a specific purpose and audience: active reading, prewriting strategies, sentence and paragraph structure, thesis statements, varied patterns of development (such as illustration, comparison and contrast, and classification), critical reading toward revision of structure and organization, editing for standard written conventions, and use and documentation of outside sources. Students submit two prewriting assignments and three essays (process analysis, comparison and contrast, and argumentation).

Objectives:

  • Use writing skills to construct well-written sentences and active reading skills to understand and analyze text
  • Develop paragraphs using topic sentences, adequate detail, supporting evidence, and transitions
  • Contrast the revising and editing steps of the writing process
  • Distinguish between different patterns of development
  • Write a process analysis essay using prewriting, drafting, revising, and editing skills
  • Recognize how to determine the reliability of secondary sources and to give proper credit to sources referenced in an essay
  • Write a comparison and contrast essay by using persuasive writing techniques to defend a claim
  • Create a sound written argument using techniques of drafting and evaluating sources

Intermediate Algebra (3 credits)
Algebra is the mathematical language used to interpret and represent patterns in numbers by using variables, expressions, and equations. Algebra is an essential tool used in business, science, and computer technology. Throughout this course, you’ll be introduced to algebraic concepts, along with real-world application problems from a variety of fields. In addition to providing a springboard to the discovery of underlying mathematical properties, these applications illustrate the importance of mathematics in your world.

Objectives:

  • Demonstrate effective quantitative skills
  • Solve algebraic equations, linear equations, inequalities, and absolute value equations
  • Solve and graph linear equations and inequalities
  • Solve polynomials
  • Apply algebraic operations to rational expressions and rational equations
  • Solve problems involving radicals and complex numbers
  • Solve quadratic equations, rational inequalities, nonlinear equations, and nonlinear inequalities
  • Calculate exponential and logarithmic functions
  • Solve binomial expansions, sequences, and arithmetic and geometric series
  • Prepare for the final exam

Textbook: Intermediate Algebra

Financial Accounting (3 credits)
This course will provide students with a basic understanding of the principles of financial accounting. Topics covered include analyzing transactions; completing the accounting cycle; merchandising businesses; inventories, assets, and liabilities; and corporations, stocks, bonds, and cash flow.

Objectives:

  • Solve important accounting principles and concepts by creating four common types of financial statements: balance sheet, income statement, statement of retained earnings, and statement of cash flows
  • Explain inventory systems, the inventory process, and the role of ethics in accounting
  • Explain cash and receivables, assets, current liabilities, and debt
  • Analyze stocks and the statement of cash flows and financial statements that are used to assess the value of a business

Nutrition (3 credits)
Nutrition is the science that investigates how the body takes in, breaks down, and uses foods. The course will provide you with basic information on how these processes take place, including information about nutrients and how they contribute to the way the body functions. This will help you to have a better understanding of your decisions about food and diet. You’ll also learn about physical activities that can contribute to a healthier lifestyle. Because a central focus of nutrition studies is on health promotion, suggestions for individual nutrition choice will be discussed, as well as tactics for maintaining a healthy weight and keeping food supplies safe.

Objectives:

  • Describe how nutrition supports a body's wellness
  • Recognize the body's use of carbohydrates, fats, and proteins
  • Identify the body's use of water, minerals, and micronutrients
  • Discuss what nutritional needs are for a healthy weight and for an athletic lifestyle
  • Define food safety and the nutritional needs of humans over a lifetime
  • Prepare a research paper on a nutritional topic

Proctored Exam
You will be required to complete a proctored exam on selected courses each semester. These assessments will evaluate the knowledge and skills that you learned during the semester. You choose the time, the location, and the qualified exam supervisor.

 

Semester 3

World Civilizations (3 credits)
This course serves as an introduction to many of the major events of the fifteenth through twenty-first centuries. It also examines the causal relationships between events and trends all across the globe.

Objectives:

  • Identify the causes and consequences of global trade and its conflicting worldwide impact
  • Describe the impact of social and industrial revolutions, fifteenth century onward, on various nations
  • Recognize the conditions that led to the World Wars, decolonization, and the Cold War
  • Summarize post–World War II effects on the economic and political structures around the world
  • Discuss an event that occurred after the fifteenth century and had an impact on a world civilization
  • Explain the effects of World War II on the world population

Textbook: A History of World Societies, Volume 2 

Business and Technical Writing (3 credits)
This course provides an introduction to the various methods of organizing material for a professional setting. Students will compose business documents using the ABC method. These include memos, emails, outlines, reports and proposals, descriptions, and organizing materials. Students also work on honing their grammar skills.

Objectives:

  • Describe the basics of the writing process and the ABC method of organizing material for a document
  • Identify the parts of speech in a sentence
  • Demonstrate correct pronoun use
  • Choose proper and effective words for writing documents
  • Identify the elements of a well-written sentence
  • Demonstrate how to use length, directness, emphasis, and variety to craft impactful sentences
  • Explain how to construct a coherent paragraph
  • Describe how to write an effective cover letter and resume
  • Format and write an interoffice memorandum, a routine business letter, and an effective email
  • Identify the different ways to write for blogs, the Internet, and social media
  • Describe how to create an organized formal outline
  • Identify the types of research and methods of documentation used in business and technical writing
  • Explain how to create visual interest and clarity in reports with illustrations, tables, graphs, charts, and overall design
  • Explain the purpose and importance of various types of informal reports
  • Describe the nature of formal reports and identify their components
  • Differentiate among external, internal, informal, and formal proposals
  • Describe an object or a process and prepare a set of instructions
  • Describe the preparation and submission of professional and technical articles and manuals

Managerial Accounting (3 credits)
This course provides an introduction to managerial accounting; analysis: C-V-P and management; budgeting and performance evaluation; decentralized operations; differential analysis and product pricing; capital investment analysis, and cost activities.

Objectives:

  • Analyze the various concepts related to managerial accounting and the cost accounting
  • Show the different tools of management used for the decision-making process
  • Identify the various budget analysis processes and the performance measurements for decision making
  • Analyze the various components of capital budgeting, cash flow statements, and ratio analysis
  • Solve examples of real-world accounting problems using knowledge of accounting forms and equations

Textbook: Managerial Accounting

Speech (3 credits)
This course provides students with a foundation in the basic concepts of public speaking. Students will learn how to research, organize and write effective speeches, incorporate presentation aids, and rehearse and deliver speeches effectively. Students will prepare, rehearse, record and submit speeches in a number of rhetorical styles to be graded.

Objectives:

  • Describe how to effectively use of the 10 necessary steps to preparing and presenting a public speech
  • Demonstrate effective delivery and presentation techniques through practice and rehearsal
  • Show how to effectively organize and present a narrative/personal experience speech
  • Make effective presentation aids to enhance your public speaking
  • Produce a speech to inform your audience of a product or service
  • Prepare a speech to persuade your audience on a topic in which you are personally invested
  • Demonstrate the key elements of public speaking through a variety of formats and occasions

Economics 1 (3 credits)
This course will provide an overview of macroeconomics and the modern market economy. Law of supply and demand, the cost of living, monetary systems, international factors, and short-run economic fluctuations will be examined and discussed.

Objectives:

  • Explain the economic systems and the economic perspective
  • Identify the key factors in macroeconomics and how economists study the economy as a whole
  • Explain the macroeconomic models and fiscal policies
  • Explain money, banking, and financial policy
  • Explain extending analysis of aggregate supply, current issues in theory and policy, and international economics
  • Analyze foreign exchange and investment and the effects each nation’s economy has on another nation’s economy

Proctored Exam
You will be required to complete a proctored exam on selected courses each semester. These assessments will evaluate the knowledge and skills that you learned during the semester. You choose the time, the location, and the qualified exam supervisor.

 

Semester 4

Art Appreciation (3 credits)
In this course, you will gain an understanding of artistic media, historical periods and artistic movements, the roles of the artist and the viewer, and the principles of art criticism.

Objectives:

  • Define the language, visual elements, and principles of design of art
  • Identify two-dimensional media
  • Identify three-dimensional media
  • Explain the evolution of art from ancient Mediterranean cultures through eighteenth century Europe
  • Identify features and popular examples of art throughout the history of African, Asian, Pacific, and American cultures
  • Compare the genres of the Modern and Postmodern eras of art from around the world

Textbook: Living with Art, 11th Edition

Business Statistics (3 credits)
In this course, you’ll learn how to make sense of the numbers that drive business decisions. You'll develop the skills to organize and visualize data effectively, enabling you to uncover relationships and draw meaningful conclusions. Probability will become your ally as you learn to express common knowledge using standardized language, allowing statisticians to communicate effectively. You'll explore unions, intersections, conditional probability, and the concept of random variables.

You’ll also gain experience estimating unknown population parameters and conducting hypothesis tests, preparing you to make reliable inferences. From analyzing variances to conducting ANOVA and linear regression, you'll gain a solid foundation in statistical techniques that are essential for making informed business decisions.

Objectives:

  • Show the methods of collecting data and visualizing qualitative data in statistics
  • Analyze the methods of computing probability for discrete and random variables
  • Apply sampling distribution methods, estimation, and hypothesis testing in business applications
  • Point out the process of computing inferences, linear regression, and least square

Advanced PC Applications (3 credits)
In this course, you'll learn to use computer software that's important to any business.

Objectives:

  • Learn about Microsoft® Access,® Word,™ PowerPoint,® and Excel.®
  • Create new Access® databases, forms, and reports.
  • Sort and filter your data with queries.
  • Analyze your data using Access.®
  • Create PowerPoint® presentations by placing and manipulating clip art.
  • Choose a background template and add notes to a PowerPoint® slide show.
  • Embed and link Word™ and Excel® material in PowerPoint® presentations.
  • Add sound, movie files, and hyperlinks to PowerPoint® presentations.
  • Embed an Excel® worksheet, chart, or graph into a Word™ document.
  • Learn the difference between object linking and embedding.
  • Study the procedure for linking an object to a Word™ document.
  • Use Microsoft® Access® to create a data source.
  • Develop a form letter with form fields.
  • Merge a database with a form letter.

Economics 2 (3 credits)
The course provides an overview of microeconomics by investigating the decisions people and businesses make at the individual level.

Objectives:

  • Explain how supply and demand influences price levels.
  • Understand the role of government in the economy, including the tax system design and labor markets.

General Elective (3 credits)
(Choose one) ...

ACC201 - Intermediate Accounting 1

Objectives:

  • Point out the process of creating journal entries and balance sheets for disclosing financial information.
  • Analyze the fundamentals of income statements, cash flow, revenue recognition, and value of money concepts.
  • Compare the different ways to properly account for cash, receivables, and inventory.
  • Analyze value and account for changes to long-term assets as well as intangible assets.
  • Prepare for the final exam.

ACC202 - Intermediate Accounting 2

Objectives:

  • Evaluate how companies deals with investments, current liabilities, and the contingencies they present.
  • Differentiate among leases, bonds, and long-term notes.
  • Analyze and account for other types of liabilities including income taxes, pensions, and post-retirement benefits.
  • Categorize the fundamentals of share-based compensation, accounting changes, and the statement of cash flows.
  • Prepare for the final exam.

ACC210 - Cost Accounting

Objectives:

  • Analyze the fundamentals and processes of cost decision making
  • Categorize the various costing processes related to cost accounting
  • Identify the methods of analyzing cost performance and the importance of management control systems
  • Apply your accounting skills on cost accounting computation and analysis
  • Prepare a balance sheet, an income statement, and post-closing trial balance for Ice Cream Systems

ACC211 - Computer Applications in Accounting

Objectives:

  • Explain how to install, register, and update the Sage 50® accounting software
  • Print reports and back up data files using Sage 50®
  • Record, post, and complete the accounting cycle for a service and merchandising enterprise using an automated accounting system
  • Analyze the business flow of transactions in automated accounting systems, including customer lists, vendor files, inventory records, and employee files
  • Demonstrate knowledge of the voucher system, accounts payable, accounts receivable, payroll systems, and departmentalized accounting
  • Analyze and solve management accounting problems relating to operations and business profitability and financial reporting

COM110 - Public Relations 1

Objectives:

  • Analyze the principles, components, and strategies involved in strategic writing
  • Categorize the principles, ethics, and methods of strategic writing in public relations
  • Point out the fundamentals of strategic writing in advertising
  • Distinguish between the principles and methods of strategic writing in sales and marketing
  • Analyze the importance of strategic writing in business communication

COM115-Public Relations 2

Objectives:

  • Analyze the role of public relations
  • Categorize the various processes involved in public relations
  • Distinguish between the tactics used by public relations for interaction
  • Point out the various public relations strategies
  • Differentiate between the various applications of public relations in different fields

FIN101- Financial Management

Objectives:

  • Categorize financial management functions and organizational structure
  • Analyze the time value of money, financial ratios, and risks and returns from investments
  • Categorize the capital structure and the capital management of a firm
  • Perform financial calculations and analysis related to basic financial concepts

FIN210 - Personal Financial Management

Objectives:

  • Apply money management skills to personal financial goals and plans
  • Formulate a plan for saving, protecting, and managing financial assets and debt
  • Develop strategies for consumer and housing purchases
  • Evaluate various types of investing
  • Determine the type of investments that best suit your financial goals
  • Construct a will, a trust, and an estate plan

HRM210 - Compensation Management

Objectives:

  • Explain the factors and methods included in compensation strategies
  • Describe how to evaluate employee performance and motivate workers using compensation strategies
  • Explain how unions, laws, and special groups affect compensation
  • Discuss labor regulation locally and globally
  • Compare job postings for different pay models
  • Demonstrate knowledge on compensation, pay models, laws, and management techniques

INT205 - Introduction to Internet Multimedia

Objectives:

  • Learn about graphics, sound, video, and animation.
  • Study the best practices for how to incorporate multimedia into your website and for a user-friendly web design.
  • Learn how to add databases to your website for greater functionality.
  • Discover the basics of e-commerce for the web and how to effectively advertise your online business.
  • Plan and design an attractive website using multimedia.

Proctored Exam
You will be required to complete a proctored exam on selected courses each semester. These assessments will evaluate the knowledge and skills that you learned during the semester. You choose the time, the location, and the qualified exam supervisor.

 

Semester 5

Essentials of Psychology (3 credits)
This course covers the psychology of biology and behavior, consciousness, memory, thought and language, intelligence, personality and gender, stress, and community influences.

Objectives:

  • Describe the science of psychology, basic structure and function of the human nervous system, and basic structure and function of the sensory system
  • Explain various states of consciousness, learning theories, and thought processes and development
  • Summarize the nature of human motivation and development, the human development cycle, and approaches to understanding and assessing personality
  • Prepare an essay on the topic of conditioning, memory, or motivation and emotion
  • Recognize psychological disorders and available treatments
  • Explain social psychology as it relates to attitudes, influences, behaviors, and stress
  • Use critical thinking skills to determine the likely causes of behaviors of individuals and groups discussed in case studies

Marketing (3 credits)
This course covers the principles of marketing. Topics covered include assessing, analyzing, understanding, and targeting the marketplace, as well as the creation, capture, delivery, and communication of value. Students will learn how to develop a marketing plan; use social and mobile marketing effectively; integrate ethics into marketing strategies; influence the consumer decision process; perform market research; perform SWOT and STP analyses; make decisions concerning branding, packaging, and developing new products; price products and services fairly; set advertising objectives; and more.

Objectives:

  • Analyze the many components that are considered and used when making marketing plans and strategies
  • Analyze the foundation of the marketing model and its emergence
  • Point out the targeted strategies and plans in marketing and globalization
  • Formulate a plan of valuing production, innovation, and product marketing
  • Develop valuing strategies for products and services in marketing
  • Categorize the strategies for supply chain management and retailing
  • Distinguish between the various domains under IMC strategies
  • Design a marketing plan for an existing business

Advanced Composition (3 credits)
In this course, you’ll practice research and writing skills by developing papers that require you to use sources and correctly cite them using APA formatting. You’ll learn to look at writing with a critical eye—a skill you can apply to your work, as well as to the reading you do for research or in your daily activities. You’ll apply these skills to your writing through editing and revising.

Objectives:

  • Analyze the fundamentals of the writing process.
  • Categorize the planning and evaluating methods of a research project and the sources.
  • Point out the sources of research and the methods of working with them.
  • Differentiate between the organizing, drafting, revising, and documenting processes related to a research project.
  • Point out the necessity of describing, illustrating, classifying, dividing, and defining your writing.
  • Prepare illustrative essay based on a specified topic.
  • Analyze the process of comparison and contrasting in developing literary content.
  • Prepare an essay using comparison and contrast.
  • Prepare a cause and effect essay on a specified topic.
  • Categorize the steps, elements, and strategies of writing and evaluating arguments.

Textbook: Successful College Writing

Human Resources Management (3 credits)
Welcome to your Human Resources Management course, which is designed to introduce you to the field. Your textbook's learning objectives, found at the outset of each chapter, are meant to introduce you to basic concepts, theories, and perspectives related to effective human resource management. Further, your text includes a wealth of case studies and features that will help you understand practical problems and applications of human resource management principles. If you're seriously thinking about a career in human resource management, you should take advantage of these extra features, even when they aren't assigned.

Objectives:

  • Describe the elements of human resource management, including labor considerations, regulation, and management of workflow
  • Explain how companies should prepare for and implement HRM to hire new employees and create training programs
  • Identify the aspects of employee, career, and turnover management
  • Summarize how employees are paid, including legal requirements, performance-based pay, commissions, salaries, and benefits
  • Describe other HRM functions including collective bargaining, labor relations, global HRM, and building a high-performance organization
  • Explain key aspects of the field of human resource management

Textbook: Fundamentals of Human Resource Management

General Elective (3 credits)
(Choose one) ...

ACC201 - Intermediate Accounting 1

Objectives:

  • Compute earnings per share.
  • Study lease transactions, cash flow, pensions, and benefits.
  • Learn about income tax accounting.
  • Analyze financial statements.

ACC202 - Intermediate Accounting 2

Objectives:

  • Study the differences between current liabilities and long-term liabilities, and focus on short-term liabilities and the contingencies they present.
  • Discover the treatment of long-term liabilities.
  • Find out the effects and treatment of income taxes.
  • Account for pensions and retirement benefits.
  • Study invested capital and earned capital in relation to the creditor’s interest in the assets of a corporation through shareholder’s equity.

ACC210 - Cost Accounting

Objectives:

  • Analyze the fundamentals and processes of cost decision making
  • Categorize the various costing processes related to cost accounting
  • Identify the methods of analyzing cost performance and the importance of management control systems
  • Apply your accounting skills on cost accounting computation and analysis
  • Prepare a balance sheet, an income statement, and post-closing trial balance for Ice Cream Systems

ACC211 - Computer Applications in Accounting

Objectives:

  • Explain how to install, register, and update the Sage 50® accounting software
  • Print reports and back up data files using Sage 50®
  • Record, post, and complete the accounting cycle for a service and merchandising enterprise using an automated accounting system
  • Analyze the business flow of transactions in automated accounting systems, including customer lists, vendor files, inventory records, and employee files
  • Demonstrate knowledge of the voucher system, accounts payable, accounts receivable, payroll systems, and departmentalized accounting
  • Analyze and solve management accounting problems relating to operations and business profitability and financial reporting

COM110 - Public Relations 1

Objectives:

  • Analyze the principles, components, and strategies involved in strategic writing
  • Categorize the principles, ethics, and methods of strategic writing in public relations
  • Point out the fundamentals of strategic writing in advertising
  • Distinguish between the principles and methods of strategic writing in sales and marketing
  • Analyze the importance of strategic writing in business communication

COM115-Public Relations 2

Objectives:

  • Get tips on research techniques and planning and evaluating a public relations program.
  • Discover how to prepare and handle printed and video news releases, media alerts and media kits, and pitch letters.
  • Explore the use of social media and the function of trade shows and exhibitions in public relations.
  • Examine conflict management and how to manage public opinion.
  • Analyze the role of public relations in a variety of sectors and settings, such as corporate, government, global, educational, nonprofit, and sports public relations.

FIN101- Financial Management

Objectives:

  • Learn about investing in long-term assets.
  • Study capital structure and dividend policy.
  • Learn all about financial planning and working capital management.

FIN210 - Personal Financial Management

Objectives:

  • Apply money management skills to personal financial goals and plans
  • Formulate a plan for saving, protecting, and managing financial assets and debt
  • Develop strategies for consumer and housing purchases
  • Evaluate various types of investing
  • Determine the type of investments that best suit your financial goals
  • Construct a will, a trust, and an estate plan

HRM210 - Compensation Management

Objectives:

  • Learn about the different forms of pay, the pay model, and compensation strategies.
  • Determine the sources of competitive advantage.
  • Study internal alignment and what factors shape internal structure.
  • Create a skills analysis and a competency analysis.
  • Learn the factors that shape external competitiveness.
  • Determine how performance pay can motivate employee behavior.
  • Analyze strategies for measuring job performance.
  • Discover the key issues in benefits planning, design, and administration.
  • Study unions and the impact of unions on wage determination.
  • Learn the laws that regulate pay in the workplace.

INT205 - Introduction to Internet Multimedia

Objectives:

  • Learn about graphics, sound, video, and animation.
  • Study the best practices for how to incorporate multimedia into your website and for a user-friendly web design.
  • Learn how to add databases to your website for greater functionality.
  • Discover the basics of e-commerce for the web and how to effectively advertise your online business.
  • Plan and design an attractive website using multimedia.

Proctored Exam
You will be required to complete a proctored exam on selected courses each semester. These assessments will evaluate the knowledge and skills that you learned during the semester. You choose the time, the location, and the qualified exam supervisor.

 

Semester 6

Legal Environment of Business (3 credits)
The nature and sources of law, the U.S. court systems, litigation and alternative methods of dispute resolution, constitutional and administrative law; tort law and product liability; contract law; agency law; business organizations; business ethics and social responsibility; and property rights for both personal and real property.

Objectives:

  • Analyze the sources and structure of the U.S. legal system, and the business laws and organizations
  • Point out the purpose, requirements, and criteria needed for contracts
  • Distinguish between real and personal property and the relationship between principal and agent
  • Analyze the principles of sales, goods, and services and laws by UCC that governs them
  • Distinguish between the role of insurance, transactions, and bankruptcy in business law
  • Create a case brief by following the instructions and procedure
  • Prepare a written memorandum by applying your knowledge and following the instructions
  • Prepare written essay responses by applying your knowledge on the legal environments of business

Textbook: Business Law with UCC Applications

Corporate Finance (3 credits)
This course will introduce you to basic financial management and analysis concepts used in both large and small corporations. One of the most important components of business operation is financial decision-making. All business decisions have some financial implications, either directly or indirectly. Many of the financial concepts addressed in this course arise every day in large companies and can also be applied to your personal financial and economic decisions.

Objectives:

  • Analyze the intricacies of corporate finance and the related financial statements
  • Categorize the methods of evaluating various types of cash flows
  • Point out the valuation procedures related to capital budgeting and the considered decisions
  • Distinguish between the various types market risks and returns
  • Differentiate between the utility of WACC, equity, and debt financing in computing investments
  • Apply your knowledge and skills acquired from this course to perform an organization analysis

Introduction to Biology (3 credits)
An introductory course that explains the origin of life and the relationships between all living things. It describes how a significant number of organisms are structured and how they work, in order to enable students to discuss intelligently the various forms of life and their processes.

Objectives:

  • Analyze cells and their processes for obtaining energy and reproducing.
  • Explain how traits are passed on from one generation to the next.
  • Explain how different species of living things have evolved and are classified.
  • Write responses to fundamental biology essay prompts.
  • Identify the characteristics and behavior of plants and animals.
  • Diagram the anatomy and physiology of the human body.
  • Describe the ecology of living things.

Business Elective (3 credits)
(Choose one) ...

BUS330 - Risk Management

Objectives:

  • Demonstrate effective written and interpersonal communication skills.
  • Demonstrate a high level of inquiry, analytical, and problem-solving skills.
  • Demonstrate effective quantitative skills.
  • Identify the types of methods of risks, effects of minimizing risk, and risk identification.
  • Analyze the types of arrangements for reducing risks, operations of state insurance, and solvency regulation.
  • Explain the importance and types of loss control and the legal liabilities in risk management.
  • Categorize the concepts, products, and issues under personal insurance.
  • Analyze the employer-employee relationship including the benefits, compensations, and regulations.
  • Analyze the benefits and risks involved in homeowners and automobile insurance.
  • Identify the types of liability insurance, crime insurance, and surety bonds.
  • Calculate the imposed social security taxes based off security insurance and retirement benefits.

FIN305 - Securities and Investments

This course explains the steps in making investment decisions, the nature of securities and markets, how technical analysis is performed, and how to set up a portfolio.

Objectives:

  • Outline the basic concepts of risk and return, how to invest, and the types of investments and investment managers
  • Summarize how stock markets function and behave, how investors choose investments, and how stocks are given value
  • Calculate various interest rates, bond values, and yields using a number of analysis formulas
  • Identify how to form a diversified portfolio and how to evaluate the portfolio's performance
  • Differentiate futures and options and the investment strategies built on each
  • Explain how investors use option valuation, financial statements, credit ratings, and economic indicators to make investment decisions

HRM320 - Employee Benefits

Objectives:

  • Discover legally required social insurance programs for employees in the United States.
  • Learn about the characteristics of group insurance and individual insurance in the categories of life, medical, dental, and disability.
  • Compare managed care plans with traditional medical expense plans.
  • Study the general requirements that must be met by qualified pension plans with respect to eligibility and plan coverage; nondiscrimination in benefits and contributions; funding; vesting; limitations on benefits and contributions; payout restrictions; and top-heavy rules.
  • Learn the difference in pension benefit formulas.
  • Discover general features of pension funding instruments and when each might best be used.
  • Interpret qualified and nonqualified pension plans.

HRM350 - Labor Relations

Objectives:

  • Demonstrate an understanding of the liberal arts, natural sciences, and social sciences
  • Demonstrate effective written and interpersonal communication skills
  • Analyze the role played by labor unions and the impact of labor laws
  • Explain labor relations management and bargaining strategies, structure, and constraints
  • Discuss empowerment, partnership, globalization, and financialization
  • Analyze various labor relations standards and considerations and what's expected of the union
  • Analyze the successes and challenges facing ALPA

Textbook: Labor Relations: Striking a Balance

HRM355 - Training Concepts

Employee training takes place in every business. In some organizations, employee training is a formalized process that continues throughout an employee’s entire career. In other organizations, employee training is an informal event used to introduce new employees to the basic skills they’ll need to complete their tasks. Your current or future employer will approach training by some combination of the two methods. This course will help you make employee training a more efficient and effective process. After completing this course, you should be a valuable asset to any employer.

Objectives:

  • Describe the various elements in the organizational training process
  • Categorize the various training designs and methods
  • Analyze the significance of development, implementation, and evaluation of training processes
  • Describe the concept of adult learning theory and how it influences employee training
  • Describe the interrelationships among the five phases of the training process model

Textbook: Employee Training and Development

MKT310 - Advertising Principles

Objectives:

  • Describe the impact that advertising and marketing have on society
  • Explain how marketers determine consumers’ purchasing motives and incorporate that information in the marketing mix
  • Describe the importance of a creative IMC plan
  • Identify ways that copy and print, electronic, and digital interactive media are used effectively in marketing
  • Explain the importance of social media, supplemental media, and relationship building in marketing strategy

Textbook: Contemporary Advertising and Integrated Marketing Communications

MKT320 - Consumer Behavior

Objectives:

  • Define consumer behavior, segmentation, targeting, and positioning
  • Explain how individual influences, such as perception, memory, attitudes, emotions, lifestyles, and decision-making processes, all influence consumer behavior
  • Describe how different social and cultural groups, roles, and expectations impact consumer behavior

MKT340 - Retail Management

Objectives:

  • Identify and analyze the fundamentals related to the world of retailing
  • Identify the strategies and components necessary for successful retailing
  • List the steps involved in the merchandise management process
  • Distinguish between the processes and strategies involved in store management
  • Prepare a professional report using retailers' strategies, layout, design, visual merchandising, and Internet retailing

Organizational Behavior (3 credits)
This course provides an overview of management approaches.

Objective:

  • Learn the process of human decision-making.
  • Study conflict management, communication in groups, power and influence, and organizational environment, structure, and design.
  • Learn about the fundamental forces of change.

Proctored Exam
You will be required to complete a proctored exam on selected courses each semester. These assessments will evaluate the knowledge and skills that you learned during the semester. You choose the time, the location, and the qualified exam supervisor.

 

Semester 7

Business Research Methods (3 credits)
This course will provide you with a foundational understanding of the scientific method and approach to a variety of research projects likely to be useful to businesses. This course focuses on human subjects and experimental design research, which has grown in use and application in business. The skills you’ll develop in this course are highly valued in today’s business environment. Focus most of your time and effort on learning new terms and the presented research structures and formats. Finally, you’ll review research reports and their design.

Objectives:

  • Explain the research process
  • Summarize the ethical considerations of research
  • Categorize the process of conducting qualitative research, observation studies, experiments, and surveys
  • Discuss measurement scales and the process of conducting questionnaires and sampling
  • Identify the process of analyzing and presenting research data
  • Prepare a case analysis report

Business Ethics (3 credits)
This course explores the ethical and moral responsibilities of businesses in a capitalist system. It examines different approaches to ethics and morality, including the principles of egoism, utilitarianism, Kant's categorical imperative, and Rawls’s theory of justice. The course also focuses on how different moral philosophies might best be applied to business organizations and their activities. Many examples and case studies are used to explain how the ethical issues facing businesses ultimately affect all of us.

Objectives:

  • Explain the importance of business ethics and decision making in terms of ethical theories and perspectives
  • Discuss how corporate culture influences business ethics and public perspectives on corporate social responsibility
  • Describe the ethical issues that arise through changes in employer responsibilities, employee obligations, technological progress, product safety concerns, and marketing methods
  • Explain how ethical corporate governance influences corporate sustainability, environmental issues, and the prevention of conflicts of interest

General Elective (3 credits)
(Choose one) ...

ACC201 - Intermediate Accounting 1

Objectives:

  • Compute earnings per share.
  • Study lease transactions, cash flow, pensions, and benefits.
  • Learn about income tax accounting.
  • Analyze financial statements.

ACC202 - Intermediate Accounting 2

Objectives:

  • Evaluate how companies should account for investing in other companies' debt and equity securities
  • Differentiate between current and long-term liabilities and properly demonstrate the accounting treatment for each
  • Analyze and account for other types of liabilities including leases, bonds, long-term notes, income taxes, pensions, and post-retirement benefits
  • Examine shareholder's equity and share-based employee compensation and how they’re represented in financial statements
  • Distinguish among various accounting changes and provide explanations for error corrections
  • Discuss the treatment of cash and noncash transactions through the statement of cash flows

ACC210 - Cost Accounting

Objectives:

  • Analyze the fundamentals and processes of cost decision making
  • Categorize the various costing processes related to cost accounting
  • Identify the methods of analyzing cost performance and the importance of management control systems
  • Apply your accounting skills on cost accounting computation and analysis
  • Prepare a balance sheet, an income statement, and post-closing trial balance for Ice Cream Systems

ACC211 - Computer Applications in Accounting

Objectives:

  • Explain how to install, register, and update the Sage 50® accounting software
  • Print reports and back up data files using Sage 50®
  • Record, post, and complete the accounting cycle for a service and merchandising enterprise using an automated accounting system
  • Analyze the business flow of transactions in automated accounting systems, including customer lists, vendor files, inventory records, and employee files
  • Demonstrate knowledge of the voucher system, accounts payable, accounts receivable, payroll systems, and departmentalized accounting
  • Analyze and solve management accounting problems relating to operations and business profitability and financial reporting

COM110 - Public Relations 1

Objectives:

  • Analyze the principles, components, and strategies involved in strategic writing
  • Categorize the principles, ethics, and methods of strategic writing in public relations
  • Point out the fundamentals of strategic writing in advertising
  • Distinguish between the principles and methods of strategic writing in sales and marketing
  • Analyze the importance of strategic writing in business communication

COM115-Public Relations 2

Objectives:

  • Get tips on research techniques and planning and evaluating a public relations program.
  • Discover how to prepare and handle printed and video news releases, media alerts and media kits, and pitch letters.
  • Explore the use of social media and the function of trade shows and exhibitions in public relations.
  • Examine conflict management and how to manage public opinion.
  • Analyze the role of public relations in a variety of sectors and settings, such as corporate, government, global, educational, nonprofit, and sports public relations.

FIN101- Financial Management

Objectives:

  • Learn about investing in long-term assets.
  • Study capital structure and dividend policy.
  • Learn all about financial planning and working capital management.

FIN210 - Personal Financial Management

Objectives:

  • Apply money management skills to personal financial goals and plans
  • Formulate a plan for saving, protecting, and managing financial assets and debt
  • Develop strategies for consumer and housing purchases
  • Evaluate various types of investing
  • Determine the type of investments that best suit your financial goals
  • Construct a will, a trust, and an estate plan

HRM210 - Compensation Management

Objectives:

  • Learn about the different forms of pay, the pay model, and compensation strategies.
  • Determine the sources of competitive advantage.
  • Study internal alignment and what factors shape internal structure.
  • Create a skills analysis and a competency analysis.
  • Learn the factors that shape external competitiveness.
  • Determine how performance pay can motivate employee behavior.
  • Analyze strategies for measuring job performance.
  • Discover the key issues in benefits planning, design, and administration.
  • Study unions and the impact of unions on wage determination.
  • Learn the laws that regulate pay in the workplace.

INT205 - Introduction to Internet Multimedia

Objectives:

  • Learn about graphics, sound, video, and animation.
  • Study the best practices for how to incorporate multimedia into your website and for a user-friendly web design.
  • Learn how to add databases to your website for greater functionality.
  • Discover the basics of e-commerce for the web and how to effectively advertise your online business.
  • Plan and design an attractive website using multimedia.

Business Elective (3 credits)
(Choose one) ...

BUS330 - Risk Management

Objectives:

  • Demonstrate effective written and interpersonal communication skills.
  • Demonstrate a high level of inquiry, analytical, and problem-solving skills.
  • Demonstrate effective quantitative skills.
  • Identify the types of methods of risks, effects of minimizing risk, and risk identification.
  • Analyze the types of arrangements for reducing risks, operations of state insurance, and solvency regulation.
  • Explain the importance and types of loss control and the legal liabilities in risk management.
  • Categorize the concepts, products, and issues under personal insurance.
  • Analyze the employer-employee relationship including the benefits, compensations, and regulations.
  • Analyze the benefits and risks involved in homeowners and automobile insurance.
  • Identify the types of liability insurance, crime insurance, and surety bonds.
  • Calculate the imposed social security taxes based off security insurance and retirement benefits.

FIN305 - Securities and Investments

Objectives:

  • Study securities, and find out about markets.
  • Study how to do a technical analysis. Learn how to select and create an investment portfolio.

HRM320 - Employee Benefits

Objectives:

  • Discover legally required social insurance programs for employees in the United States.
  • Learn about the characteristics of group insurance and individual insurance in the categories of life, medical, dental, and disability.
  • Compare managed care plans with traditional medical expense plans.
  • Study the general requirements that must be met by qualified pension plans with respect to eligibility and plan coverage; nondiscrimination in benefits and contributions; funding; vesting; limitations on benefits and contributions; payout restrictions; and top-heavy rules.
  • Learn the difference in pension benefit formulas.
  • Discover general features of pension funding instruments and when each might best be used.
  • Interpret qualified and nonqualified pension plans.

HRM350 - Labor Relations

Objectives:

  • Learn the current trends in labor organization in light of changes in the labor force, such as the trend toward a two-tier wage system.
  • Discover why workers join unions and why management is sometimes not enthusiastic about unions.
  • Study the long struggle to establish the voice of organized labor in America from the nineteenth century to the present.
  • Discover the relationship between national and local unions.
  • Learn characteristics of the collective bargaining process and why early negotiations are marked by exaggerated demands.
  • Study variables that impact labor management negotiations
  • Find out the two major approaches to wage adjustments: escalator clauses and wage reopeners.
  • Study the nature of concessionary bargaining on the part of organized labor.
  • Study administrative issues under collective bargaining, including the role of seniority and affirmative action.

HRM355 - Training Concepts

Objectives:

  • Learn the strategic planning process, its components, and their relationships.
  • Get theoretical approaches to learning and the importance of a training needs analysis.
  • Write effective learning objectives.
  • Discover the strengths and weaknesses of different training delivery methods.
  • Identify elements of the development and implementation of training.
  • Learn best practies in various training areas.
  • Discover different types of management development.

MKT310 - Advertising Principles

Objectives:

  • Discover services provided by an advertising agency.
  • Get the major trends in the history of American advertising.
  • Study persuasive techniques used to market products and services.
  • Recognize the purposes of advertising research.
  • Study how advertisements are created for print, radio, television, and Internet audiences.
  • Discover the societal and governmental forces that regulate the advertising industry.

MKT320 - Consumer Behavior

Objectives:

  • Define consumer behavior, segmentation, targeting, and positioning
  • Explain how individual influences, such as perception, memory, attitudes, emotions, lifestyles, and decision-making processes, all influence consumer behavior
  • Describe how different social and cultural groups, roles, and expectations impact consumer behavior

MKT340 - Retail Management

Objectives:

  • Study the basics of retailing and how to manage a successful retail business.
  • Discover important merchandising principles.

International Business (3 credits)
Learn theories of and influences on international trade.

Objectives:

  • Identify cultural forces and values managers must recognize.
  • Summarize how environmental, political, economic, and socioeconomic factors relate to business.
  • Study labor and employment factors that affect productivity and profitability.
  • Learn methods for entering the international market and the decision-making process among parent and subsidiary units of an international company.
  • Discover the difference between domestic and international marketing.
  • Get an overview of the challenges of staffing overseas offices and the major challenges of international accounting.

Proctored Exam
You will be required to complete a proctored exam on selected courses each semester. These assessments will evaluate the knowledge and skills that you learned during the semester. You choose the time, the location, and the qualified exam supervisor.

 

Semester 8

Strategic Business Management (3 credits)
In this course, you'll learn the elements of good strategy, good strategy execution, and good management.

Objectives:

  • Describe the five phases of strategy and the execution processes
  • Analyze a company’s environment, resources, capabilities, and competiveness
  • Apply strategies to be competitive in the marketplace, hire talent, diversify, manage ethical and social responsibilities
  • Create strategies to build organizational structure, manage internal operations, and cultivate corporate culture

Senior Capstone: Business (4 credits)
In this capstone, exercise your critical thinking skills by using case studies to explain the benefits of professional-development activities.

Objectives:

  • Evaluate the professional-development potential of specific workshops, conferences, seminars, and professional business meetings.
  • Plan for and arrange to attend professional development events.
  • Present your reflections on the value of professional development activities.
  • Identify discernible errors, irregularities, and improprieties in style and format within publicly reported data.
  • Meet financial statement presentation requirements for a specific real-world example.
  • Estimate variable and fixed costs for a publicly traded company.
  • Assess publicly disseminated information from publicly traded companies to determine the feasibility of market potential and market penetration.
  • Apply knowledge of generally accepted accounting principles to a specific real-world example.
  • Integrate statistical analyses and scatter plots, line graphs, and regression to determine the reliability of financial information prepared for external use.
  • Use analytical review procedures to examine a firm’s financial statements.

General Elective (3 credits)
(Choose one) ...

ACC201 - Intermediate Accounting 1

Objectives:

  • Compute earnings per share.
  • Study lease transactions, cash flow, pensions, and benefits.
  • Learn about income tax accounting.
  • Analyze financial statements.

ACC202 - Intermediate Accounting 2

Objectives:

  • Study the differences between current liabilities and long-term liabilities, and focus on short-term liabilities and the contingencies they present.
  • Discover the treatment of long-term liabilities.
  • Find out the effects and treatment of income taxes.
  • Account for pensions and retirement benefits.
  • Study invested capital and earned capital in relation to the creditor’s interest in the assets of a corporation through shareholder’s equity.

ACC210 - Cost Accounting

Objectives:

  • Analyze the fundamentals and processes of cost decision making
  • Categorize the various costing processes related to cost accounting
  • Identify the methods of analyzing cost performance and the importance of management control systems
  • Apply your accounting skills on cost accounting computation and analysis
  • Prepare a balance sheet, an income statement, and post-closing trial balance for Ice Cream Systems

ACC211 - Computer Applications in Accounting

Objectives:

  • Explain how to install, register, and update the Sage 50® accounting software
  • Print reports and back up data files using Sage 50®
  • Record, post, and complete the accounting cycle for a service and merchandising enterprise using an automated accounting system
  • Analyze the business flow of transactions in automated accounting systems, including customer lists, vendor files, inventory records, and employee files
  • Demonstrate knowledge of the voucher system, accounts payable, accounts receivable, payroll systems, and departmentalized accounting
  • Analyze and solve management accounting problems relating to operations and business profitability and financial reporting

COM110 - Public Relations 1

Objectives:

  • Analyze the principles, components, and strategies involved in strategic writing
  • Categorize the principles, ethics, and methods of strategic writing in public relations
  • Point out the fundamentals of strategic writing in advertising
  • Distinguish between the principles and methods of strategic writing in sales and marketing
  • Analyze the importance of strategic writing in business communication

COM115-Public Relations 2

Objectives:

  • Get tips on research techniques and planning and evaluating a public relations program.
  • Discover how to prepare and handle printed and video news releases, media alerts and media kits, and pitch letters.
  • Explore the use of social media and the function of trade shows and exhibitions in public relations.
  • Examine conflict management and how to manage public opinion.
  • Analyze the role of public relations in a variety of sectors and settings, such as corporate, government, global, educational, nonprofit, and sports public relations.

FIN101- Financial Management

Objectives:

  • Learn about investing in long-term assets.
  • Study capital structure and dividend policy.
  • Learn all about financial planning and working capital management.

FIN210 - Personal Financial Management

Objectives:

  • Apply money management skills to personal financial goals and plans
  • Formulate a plan for saving, protecting, and managing financial assets and debt
  • Develop strategies for consumer and housing purchases
  • Evaluate various types of investing
  • Determine the type of investments that best suit your financial goals
  • Construct a will, a trust, and an estate plan

HRM210 - Compensation Management

Objectives:

  • Learn about the different forms of pay, the pay model, and compensation strategies.
  • Determine the sources of competitive advantage.
  • Study internal alignment and what factors shape internal structure.
  • Create a skills analysis and a competency analysis.
  • Learn the factors that shape external competitiveness.
  • Determine how performance pay can motivate employee behavior.
  • Analyze strategies for measuring job performance.
  • Discover the key issues in benefits planning, design, and administration.
  • Study unions and the impact of unions on wage determination.
  • Learn the laws that regulate pay in the workplace.

INT205 - Introduction to Internet Multimedia

Objectives:

  • Learn about graphics, sound, video, and animation.
  • Study the best practices for how to incorporate multimedia into your website and for a user-friendly web design.
  • Learn how to add databases to your website for greater functionality.
  • Discover the basics of e-commerce for the web and how to effectively advertise your online business.
  • Plan and design an attractive website using multimedia.

Business Electives (6 credits)
(Choose one) ...

BUS330 - Risk Management

Objectives:

  • Demonstrate effective written and interpersonal communication skills.
  • Demonstrate a high level of inquiry, analytical, and problem-solving skills.
  • Demonstrate effective quantitative skills.
  • Identify the types of methods of risks, effects of minimizing risk, and risk identification.
  • Analyze the types of arrangements for reducing risks, operations of state insurance, and solvency regulation.
  • Explain the importance and types of loss control and the legal liabilities in risk management.
  • Categorize the concepts, products, and issues under personal insurance.
  • Analyze the employer-employee relationship including the benefits, compensations, and regulations.
  • Analyze the benefits and risks involved in homeowners and automobile insurance.
  • Identify the types of liability insurance, crime insurance, and surety bonds.
  • Calculate the imposed social security taxes based off security insurance and retirement benefits.

FIN305 - Securities and Investments

Objectives:

  • Study securities, and find out about markets.
  • Study how to do a technical analysis. Learn how to select and create an investment portfolio.

HRM320 - Employee Benefits

Objectives:

  • Discover legally required social insurance programs for employees in the United States.
  • Learn about the characteristics of group insurance and individual insurance in the categories of life, medical, dental, and disability.
  • Compare managed care plans with traditional medical expense plans.
  • Study the general requirements that must be met by qualified pension plans with respect to eligibility and plan coverage; nondiscrimination in benefits and contributions; funding; vesting; limitations on benefits and contributions; payout restrictions; and top-heavy rules.
  • Learn the difference in pension benefit formulas.
  • Discover general features of pension funding instruments and when each might best be used.
  • Interpret qualified and nonqualified pension plans.

HRM350 - Labor Relations

Objectives:

  • Learn the current trends in labor organization in light of changes in the labor force, such as the trend toward a two-tier wage system.
  • Discover why workers join unions and why management is sometimes not enthusiastic about unions.
  • Study the long struggle to establish the voice of organized labor in America from the nineteenth century to the present.
  • Discover the relationship between national and local unions.
  • Learn characteristics of the collective bargaining process and why early negotiations are marked by exaggerated demands.
  • Study variables that impact labor management negotiations
  • Find out the two major approaches to wage adjustments: escalator clauses and wage reopeners.
  • Study the nature of concessionary bargaining on the part of organized labor.
  • Study administrative issues under collective bargaining, including the role of seniority and affirmative action.

HRM355 - Training Concepts

Objectives:

  • Learn the strategic planning process, its components, and their relationships.
  • Get theoretical approaches to learning and the importance of a training needs analysis.
  • Write effective learning objectives.
  • Discover the strengths and weaknesses of different training delivery methods.
  • Identify elements of the development and implementation of training.
  • Learn best practies in various training areas.
  • Discover different types of management development.

MKT310 - Advertising Principles

Objectives:

  • Discover services provided by an advertising agency.
  • Get the major trends in the history of American advertising.
  • Study persuasive techniques used to market products and services.
  • Recognize the purposes of advertising research.
  • Study how advertisements are created for print, radio, television, and Internet audiences.
  • Discover the societal and governmental forces that regulate the advertising industry.

MKT320 - Consumer Behavior

Objectives:

  • Define consumer behavior, segmentation, targeting, and positioning
  • Explain how individual influences, such as perception, memory, attitudes, emotions, lifestyles, and decision-making processes, all influence consumer behavior
  • Describe how different social and cultural groups, roles, and expectations impact consumer behavior

MKT340 - Retail Management

Objectives:

  • Study the basics of retailing and how to manage a successful retail business.
  • Discover important merchandising principles.

Proctored Exam
You will be required to complete a proctored exam on selected courses each semester. These assessments will evaluate the knowledge and skills that you learned during the semester. You choose the time, the location, and the qualified exam supervisor.

Graduation Requirements

  • Complete all 8 semesters.
  • Pass all courses.
  • Achieve a cumulative Quality Point Average (QPA) of 2.0 or higher.

 

 

Online Library and Librarian
Students at Penn Foster College have access to an online library during their college studies. Students can use the library to do the required course research or for general reference and links to valuable resources. The library contains helpful research assistance, articles, databases, books, and Web links. A librarian is available to answer questions on general research-related topics via email and will assist students in research activities.

* As a degree candidate, you will take a proctored examination at the end of each semester on selected courses within that semester. We make it easy because you pick the location and the person you want to supervise the exam, as long as Penn Foster College's established policy and qualifications are met. Complete information packets with procedures will be provided well in advance, before completion of final semester coursework.

You must complete all eight semesters, pass all courses, and achieve a cumulative Quality Point Average (QPA) of 2.0, or higher, in all studies to graduate and earn your Bachelor's Degree.

We reserve the right to change program content and materials when it becomes necessary.

NOTE: Shipments for students with advanced standing may vary from the schedule.

Although this outline covers 120 credits of the Business Management Bachelor's Degree Program, you receive lesson materials for each semester as you enroll.

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